‘Thing is, though,’ he said, ‘I reckon I’m going to have to give up the shop.’
‘Oh, Gerry!’
She knew how much it meant to him. The shop was what he had been aiming at for all these years, ever since he was just a kid working at old Rooney’s after school.
‘I can’t pay the rent. In fact, I ain’t paid it for weeks. There was always someone breathing down my neck. Well, you know that. But now the rent man’s on to me.’
‘Oh, Gerry, that’s terrible. Ain’t there no way you can hang on to it? Hold him off for a bit?’
Sadly, he shook his head. ‘I tried, girl. But I’m going to have to let it go.’
All one Sunday, they toiled to clear the shop out. It was depressing work. Only a short while ago they had laboured to clean it up and bring stock in and arrange everything on the shelves and in the window. It had been a big new adventure then, and their energy seemed boundless. Now it was all a terrible effort, draining them of even the ability to speak. Ellen tried to keep up a flow of chatter for a while, and Gerry gamely attempted to respond, but in the end they lapsed into silence. Back and forth they trudged with the handcart, taking what was left of the goods to be stored in Gerry’s bedroom until it could be transported up to Poplar to be sold on the stall.
In the street, the girls were squatting on the kerb playing cat’s cradle, the boys were flicking cigarette cards, the old folk sat on chairs outside their doors, and some of the mothers were gossiping, arms folded, shoulders leant against the wall. Ellen could feel their eyes upon her and knew what they were thinking, what they were saying once her back was turned. There was sympathy for Gerry in his plight, but there was also a strong element of ‘I told you so’. They were even rather satisfied that he had failed, since it proved that he was no richer or cleverer than anyone else in the street, after all. Ellen wanted to shout at their smug faces, to point out that at least he had tried, at least he saw something beyond the hand-to-mouth existence that they all took for granted.
At last it was all done, and they took a final look around the empty premises. Gerry’s shoulders were slumped, his voice flat and toneless.
‘I better take the key round the landlord’s office and stick it through the door.’
Ellen had never heard him sound so defeated. On impulse, she reached out and put an arm round his waist.
‘It’s not the end yet, you know, Gerry. You still got the stall, you still got loads of stock. You’ll bounce back, I know you will.’
In answer, he held her close, hugging her to him with a fierce strength, burying his face in her neck.
‘You’re the best, Ellen,’ he said, his voice muffled against her skin. ‘You’re the very best. I love you.’
The words jolted through her heart. She wished she could say what he wanted her to, that she loved him, but she could not. She liked him, he was a good pal and she was very fond of him. But love – that was something different, that was what she had felt for Harry, what she still felt for Harry. When they were together, the whole world had been a brighter place and she had lived on a higher level where everything was new and sparkling and full of wonderful opportunities. Even a simple walk to the shops or a drink in a pub had been an exciting expedition when Harry was by her side. It was not the same with Gerry.
‘You’re a real pal, Gerry,’ she said lamely. To gloss over the lack of passion, she rushed on, ‘This is only a little setback, I’m sure of it. You’ll get what you want one day. You’ve always got what you wanted, ain’t you?’
‘Not everything,’ he said bleakly.
Ellen knew very well what he meant. ‘Nobody ever gets everything,’ she said, with feeling.
‘No, I s’pose not.’ He released her, making a visible effort to act as if everything was all right. ‘I’ll take this key back, then. See you tomorrow.’
Ellen was left feeling that she had failed him.
Quitting the shop eased the difficulties for a while, but it did not solve them. Gerry still seemed to spend a lot of time either placating people or avoiding them. Late one Saturday he appeared at the market, breathless and harried, and demanded all the money that had been taken so far. As Ellen emptied out her apron into his hands, he kept glancing over his shoulder as if expecting someone to pounce on him.
‘What is it?’ Ellen asked. ‘What’s up? Who’s after you?’
‘It’s that bloody Praed again. He’s out to get me.’
‘Praed? I thought you’d settled with him.’
‘Only part of it, enough to get him off my back. Now he wants the rest. With interest.’
‘Oh, Gerry.’ With shaking fingers, she scraped out every last farthing. ‘Will that be enough? Will he be satisfied with that?’
‘I flaming well hope so.’
Gerry stuffed it in his pockets and made off through the crowd.
Ellen packed up the stall on her own that day. One of the other stall holders helped her to pull the cart back to the store. She hung around for a while, expecting Gerry to come, but he did not. In the end she locked up and took the tram back to the Island, worry gnawing at her. Praed had a nasty reputation. The other market traders thought that Gerry had been foolish to get mixed up with him.
She did not go directly home, but stopped off at the Billinghams’. Alma was busy getting tea ready.
‘No, love, I ain’t seen hide nor hair of him all day,’ she said in answer to Ellen’s anxious enquiry. ‘I thought he was up the stall with you.’
‘No.’ Ellen did not know whether to tell Alma what she knew. Best not to worry her, she decided. She handed over the last of the day’s takings. ‘He might need this. I think he’s a bit short at the moment.’
Alma sighed. ‘Too true he is, lovey. I’ll give it him when he comes in. Staying for a cuppa?’
‘My mum’s expecting me, thanks. But would you ask him to step along and let me know he’s back, when he does turn up?’
Alma followed her to the door. She gave Ellen a quick kiss on the cheek.
‘Don’t you worry, I’ll make sure he does.’
But Ellen hardly heard her. Harry had just come out of number forty-seven and was walking down the street. He was all dressed up for Saturday night in a navy suit and stiff collar, a bowler hat at a rakish angle on his blond curls. Ellen found herself gaping at him. As he drew level with her, their eyes met and she felt a hot flush rising up her neck. He gave a curt nod.
‘’Evening, Aunt Alma, Ellen.’
‘’Evening,’ Ellen answered, equally coldly.
Alma watched his retreating back. ‘Hmph. Bet I know where he’s off to, him and all his mates. To watch that Siobhan doing her act.’
‘What?’
‘Oh yeah, haven’t you heard? She’s back. Large as life and twice as natural. Not staying here no more, of course. But she’s playing in London, at the Gattis. That’s where they’re all off to, all the young lightermen. They always goes to the Gattis.’
Ellen felt as if she had been kicked in the stomach. All this time, despite the fact that she and Harry were hardly on speaking terms, she had nursed a secret hope that one day they might make it up. Not that she would ever make the first move. As the injured party, she felt that was not her place. Her mother had hinted that maybe Harry considered himself the injured party, what with her going out with Gerry. Ellen did not see this at all. She was just good pals with Gerry. That was altogether different from what Harry had got up to with Siobhan. Why, if she had not disappeared into the blue like that, they would have been married with a baby, possibly two by now. It was not the same at all. And so things had stayed in a stalemate, with both of them too stiffnecked to give an inch. Now she suddenly saw it all in a different light. It was not just an interlude, however long, before they got together again. It was over. Harry worked long hours during the week and went out spending freely on Saturday night and Sunday. He had a full life. And now he was off to see Siobhan perform. She walked slowly home, her heart full.
It was a subdued Gerry who fi
nally turned up at gone nine o’clock. Ellen flew into the front parlour the moment she heard his knock on the door.
‘What happened?’ she demanded. ‘You all right? He didn’t beat you up, did he?’
‘No, no, I’m all right. I done it. Paid him off.’
It was said with such conviction that Ellen believed him. She was not to know that it had been done with borrowed money.
‘That’s good. That’s real relief. You mean Praed’s right off your back now?’
‘Yeah. All paid up.’ Only there was a new loan to pay back now.
‘That’s real good news, Gerry. The best I heard for ages. Oh – by the way, I left the last of today’s takings with your mum.’
‘Yeah, thanks, she gave it to me. You took your wages out of it, I hope?’
‘No,’ Ellen admitted. ‘I didn’t know how pushed you were.’
Gerry reached out and pulled her to him, kissing her on the lips. ‘You’re one in a million, Ellen. When I’m out of this mess – and I’m over the worst now – will you marry me?’
Ellen stared at him, not knowing what to say. He flushed, as if the question had been just as unexpected to him.
‘What d’you say, Ellen? Will you? I never had the courage to ask you before, but you stuck by me through all this, and that must mean I’m more than just a neighbour to you.’
‘Oh, you are, Gerry. And anyway, I couldn’t have walked out when you was in trouble, now could 1? It’s just . . .’
It was just that he was not Harry. When Harry came upon a crisis, you could rely on him to know just what to do. There would be no fuss and bother, he would calmly take command, and people would do as he asked them because they respected him. Gerry was clever, and fun to be with, but when it came down to it, Harry was a rock, whereas Gerry was built on sand.
But she could not tell him that in so many words.
‘You know I’ve always loved you, Ellen. For years, ever since you was just a kid. These last months, I couldn’t have hung on if it hadn’t been for you. I’d’ve gone under, honest I would, but I kept going, ’cos I had you to think about. It’s all been for you. And I can build it up again, I know I can, if I got you with me.’
A rock could stand up to the storms of life. Harry didn’t need her. He had more than proved that. You could even take away his job, his family, his friends, and he would still be strong. She looked at Gerry, at his kind face, his anxious eyes. Gerry loved her. More than that, he needed her.
‘I dunno, Gerry, I can’t make my mind up just like that.’
‘You don’t have to,’ he assured her. ‘Not right away. I’m not asking that. I’m not asking you to marry me now, not with things like what they are. Oh no, it’s got to be done proper, when I’m back on my feet again and I can afford to rent us a place of our own. Look – I’ll ask you again in six months. How about that? In six months, you can give me an answer, yes or no. That sound all right to you?’
Relieved at being let off the hook, Ellen agreed.
It was less than six months later that a house unexpectedly fell vacant in Trinidad Street.
‘Do nicely for you and Gerry,’ Martha remarked, as she stood ironing sheets. ‘Mind you, I dunno what you young people are coming to these days, needing a whole place of your own before you get wed. When me and your dad got married we just had a back bedroom at his parents’ place. All you need to start with. Still, you could have a couple of lodgers to help with the rent, like. Always someone needing a room.’
‘Mum!’ Ellen was horrified. ‘I always thought you was on my side.’
‘Your side? Of course I’m on your side, lovey. What on earth do you mean?’
‘I mean about marrying Gerry. Everyone expects me to, but I ain’t said nothing, now have I?’
Martha gave an indulgent laugh. ‘You don’t need to, do you? It’s plain as the nose on your face that you’re only keeping the poor sod hanging about. You’ve had long enough to make your mind up, God knows.’
‘I know.’ Ellen sighed. ‘Trouble is, I can’t make my mind up, and that’s a fact.’
Martha sat down and gave her daughter her whole attention. ‘You’re not still carrying a torch for Harry Turner, are you?’ she asked shrewdly.
‘Well . . .’
‘I thought as much. Trouble with you, my girl, you believe all them books you keep reading. All very nice, I’m sure, but you got to live in the real world, ain’t you? If you wanted Harry, you should’ve gone and made it up with him ages ago, like what I told you to, not gone on working with Gerry and going out with him in the evenings. That’s not fair to anyone, now is it? Least of all Gerry. He’s all right, he is. Bit on the fly side but his heart’s in the right place. You could go a lot further and fare a lot worse than Gerry. You think about it, or you might find that chance slipping through your fingers and all.’
‘I do think about it. I lie awake at night thinking about it. But it don’t seem to do no good.’
‘Well, I’ll tell you something what might get your brain working. That Siobhan’s come back.’
As always, the very sound of her name gave Ellen a sick feeling. And it was mentioned quite often now she had returned from her tour.
‘I know. She’s doing the London halls again.’
‘No, I don’t mean just back in London, I mean back here, in Trinidad Street.’
‘She’s never!’
Dismay was followed rapidly by anger. She had never forgiven Siobhan, and she never would. While she was out of sight, Ellen managed to keep her more or less out of mind, but here in the street she was nothing less than a threat to everyone, and especially to Ellen.
‘You mean she’s staying? What does Mrs O’Donaghue say to that? She’s not stopping with them again, is she?’
‘I dunno, love. She only come this afternoon. Just turned up out of the blue, all dressed up to the nines’ – she paused for effect – ‘in a cab.’
‘A cab?’
‘First time I ever saw one down our street. Caused quite a stir, it did.’
‘Yeah, I bet it did.’
If Siobhan had come back for Harry, Ellen could not bear it. If he were to marry anyone else she could accept it, with great difficulty, as long as she was good enough for him. But not Siobhan.
‘If she so much as looks at Harry, I’ll tear her eyes out,’ she said. And she meant it.
It was ten days later that she actually saw Siobhan again. She was at the door of the now vacant house – number forty-five, right next to the Turners’. Fuelled with the darkest suspicion, Ellen marched over the road to accost her.
‘Didn’t think we’d see the likes of you back here again,’ she said.
‘Oh? Why ever not? This is where my family is.’ Siobhan gave her a look of innocent surprise.
Ellen felt as if her head was about to burst. ‘Moving back in then, are you? I’d’ve thought you was used to flasher places than this by now. Can’t see you sharing with all the O’Donaghues again.’
‘I don’t need to share with them,’ Siobhan told her with a patronizing smile. ‘I’ve a few bob of my own now, and, as you say, I’m used to something better. But family’s family, after all.’ She opened a gloved hand to reveal a sturdy door-key. ‘I’m thinking of taking this place.’
‘You’re what?’
The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them. She flushed, furious at herself for sounding at a disadvantage.
‘I thought it might be quite nice,’ Siobhan was saying, obviously enjoying herself. ‘The stage is such a strange life. People come and go, you see too much of them for a short while then nothing at all for months. It’s best to keep a hold of your old friends, don’t you think?’
‘Well, you can’t have this house,’ Ellen heard herself saying. ‘It’s spoken for already.’
‘That’s not what they said at the landlord’s office.’ For the first time, Siobhan looked slightly put out.
‘You must’ve been talking to the wrong person.’
‘’Cos I’m the one what’s taking it.’ She did not know what had made her say it. It just seemed the only way to keep Siobhan out.
‘You? You and who else?’ The smile became pure poison. ‘You and Harry?’
If she hoped to wound, she succeeded. But Ellen was not going to let her know that.
‘Harry?’ she said, as if it were some sick joke. ‘Oh no, you done me a favour there, Siobhan. I’m real grateful to you. It’s not Harry, it’s Gerry. Me and Gerry are moving in here – it’s all fixed. So you better let me have that key.’
To her deep satisfaction, Siobhan was silenced. She held out her hand, and Siobhan placed the key in it.
‘Thanks,’ she said, and walked off home without a backward glance.
4
‘FUNNY,’ MAISIE SAID, sticking a pin through her hat to anchor it to her hair, ‘I never thought Ellen would go and marry Gerry. I always thought her and our Harry would get together in the end.’
Will grunted. He was fed up with this wedding before it even started. People seemed to have talked of nothing else for the past month.
Maisie carried on regardless. There were very few high spots in her life and she was out to make the most of this one.
‘My mum thinks she’s only doing it for his money,’ she said.
‘Your mum would,’ Will snapped.
He was knotting a tie under his one and only stiff collar and he knew it was going to give him gip.
Downstairs Albert and Lily started scrapping, and Tommy, with all the authority of eight years, was telling them off. Maisie sighed and wailed down the stairs.
‘Leave off, you lot, you’ll wake the baby.’
If they heard her at all, the children took no notice.
‘I’ll be bloody glad when this is over,’ Will muttered, still trying to get his tie looking right. ‘Go and shut them kids up, for God’s sake.’
Maisie sighed again and left the bedroom. Will looked morosely at his reflection in the tarnished mirror. Nothing about this wedding pleased him. It was because of his stupid sister that Siobhan was not after all going to come back to Trinidad Street. And Harry bloody Turner was still free, which meant he could still end up with Siobhan after all. There was not even the remotest chance of Siobhan turning up for the ceremony, since the O’Donaghues were still on the outs with the Billinghams. The only saving grace of the day was the opportunity to get totally pissed in the pub in the evening.
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